Much-heralded prospect (listed as the Astros top-ranked prospect here and here, was 2009's Organizational Prospect of the Year, and was voted Baseball America's best changeup) Jordan Lyles has been one of the brightest spots in what has been regarded as a wasteland in the Astros' farm system. So what happened? Lyles was dominant in his first full season with the Astros (he threw 55.1IP in 2008). With great control (Brad Dydalewicz allowed four fewer walks in 2009 than Lyles has in two seasons), Lyles may jump Lancaster and head straight to Corpus as a 19-year old with huge upside.

What went right?

It's hard to pick. The K:BB ratio is pretty incredible, and Lyles managed to post 31 strikeouts in 35.1IP with RISP.

What went wrong?

This is also hard to pick, but if we're going to be picky, we can talk about Lyles' tendency to allow fly-ball outs. His GO/AO was 1.02:1 in 2009, meaning he gave up just as many flyball outs as he did groundball outs. So it would be nice to see more groundballs, but let's keep in mind that, of his 434 outs recorded in 2009, almost 40% of them were via strikeout.

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